It was a tight race between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the opposition headed by Congress for the 16 Rajya Sabha seats (India’s Upper House of parliament) throughout Indian states. The BJP won easily in certain states, but the Congress and other opposition parties fought hard in others. There were also accusations about rule violations and cross-voting. The result is crucial for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party ahead of the Presidential elections, in which members of both the Lok Sabha (Lower House) and the Rajya Sabha vote.
The recent electoral triumph is likely to let the BJP’s nominee for Indian president (still to be announced) glide through without incident since the ruling party now has a majority in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Elections were held in four states: Maharashtra, Karnataka, Rajasthan, and Haryana. The BJP won three out of six seats in Maharashtra and three out of four in Karnataka. The BJP won one of two seats in Haryana, while an Independent candidate backed by the saffron party won the other.
The Congress won all four seats in Rajasthan, while also capturing one in Karnataka and Maharashtra. In Maharashtra, the ruling Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress coalition was jolted when the main opposition BJP won three of the state’s six Rajya Sabha seats, as declared early Saturday. Union minister Piyush Goyal, former state minister Anil Bonde, and Dhananjay Mahadik are among the BJP’s victors. The Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Raut, the NCP’s Praful Patel, a former union minister, and the Congress’ Imran Pratapgarhi also won the hard-fought polls.
Former BJP MP Dhananjay Mahadik beat Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Pawar for the sixth seat. The Congress suffered a severe blow in Haryana, where the BJP’s Krishan Lal Panwar and the saffron party-backed Independent candidate Kartikeya Sharma won the two seats, while the grand old party’s Ajay Maken, a former cabinet minister, lost. According to R K Nandal, Panwar received 36 votes, while Sharma received 23 first-choice votes and 6.6 votes transferred by the BJP, bringing his total to 29.6. Maken received 29 votes but lost due to a lack of second preference votes.
The major opposition Congress won just one of the two seats for which its contenders were nominated, while the JD(S) came up empty-handed. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman of the BJP, actor-politician Jaggesh and MLC Lehar Singh Siroya of the Congress, and former Union Minister Jairam Ramesh of the Congress were proclaimed winners. Karnataka’s Rajya Sabha members Sitharaman and Ramesh have been re-elected.
The outcome of the struggle for the fourth seat was uncertain, since it was a close race between all three main political parties, none of which had enough votes for an easy triumph. However, the BJP’s Siroya defeated Mansoor Ali Khan of the Congress and D Kupendra Reddy of the JDS, backed by cross-voting from rival parties and the assistance of Independents. In Rajasthan, the governing Congress won three out of the four seats, while the BJP won one.
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